Even though most of the tutorial pages here deal with on-camera flash, I don’t limit myself to just using on-camera flash. When I need off-camera lighting or when I need more juice from my flashguns than a speedlight can deliver, I use the Q-flashes made by Quantum. 

For this wedding in Las Vegas, I decided to travel light and as an additional flashgun, bring along a single Quantum Q-flash in addition to the two speedlights I normally take along with me when I photograph a destination wedding.  I also wanted the flexibility of wireless TTL control over the flash, and therefore I chose a Quantum T5D-R with the Quantum Freewire Wireless TTL set-up.

In the photo above taken at Red Rock near Las Vegas, I had my assistant hold the Q-flash up high on a monopod and triggered it wirelessly.  This way I could fine-tune the flash exposure from the camera itself.  This allowed me to work faster than having either me or my assistant manually adjusting the flash the whole time.  (Anyone who is interested in my specific settings, the thought process is similar to the explanation here.)  I had the Wide-Angle Diffuser over the Q-flash, to spread the light more widely.

The Q-flash’s flexibility and power really came in handy for this next image. 

After the wedding we went to this famous landmark for a big group photo. I had to work fast to keep everyone’s attention since it had been a long day.  Also, the cops had just stopped to move the two buses out of the middle lane … so I really had to shoot fast and nail the few images I took here.

I needed a lot of light, and I needed the light as even from left-to-right as possible - so I had my assistant hold up the  Q-flash T5D-R with a Quantum wide-angle diffuser -  and had her pointing this through a white shoot-through umbrella to get the light spreading more evenly.  In the end I did have to go in to Photoshop to dodge the people on the left a little to bring them up to the same brightness as the rest of the group.  But using a powerful flashgun in this way gave me a very good headstart on this image.

So I am showing this here as an example of something simple that you can’t do with a speedlight.  When I need juice! .. and an even spread of light and a set-up that works fast, I revert to using Q-flashes.

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For those who are interested in the specific gear, here are the details of the exact equipment :

__(’Read the rest of this entry »’)

I have substantially rewritten my original page on the use of flash brackets.  Digital photography technology is steadily improving to the point where we now have cameras with fairly clean 1600 ISO settings, and very usable 3200 ISO. It is now ever more easy to get great results with bounce flash, and have all the light from the flash be indirect.  With this, the need for me to use a flash bracket, has been greatly reduced.

Rotating flash brackets are cumbersome attachments between the camera and flash, which enables the flash to always be over the camera. Since the flash is always overhead of the camera with a flash bracket, regardless of whether you’re shooting horizontally or vertically, there is no sideways shadow … if you use direct flash to some extent, or a flash modifier on your camera.

It is now possible for me to get vertical images like these, using on-camera flash, with no trace of sideways shadows … because there is no light thrown directly forward from the flash itself.  The light is all indirect. This means there will be no noticeable shadow regardless of how my flash is positioned on top of my camera.

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These two recent posts are also relevant to this:

• choosing your direction
• my choice of flash modifiers

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So these days I get by without a flash bracket, and I thought it pertinent to update the webpage to reflect this.

What are your settings?  -  a question that I am often asked about various images. 
And quite often, the answer is surprising  -  it doesn’t really matter.   
Sometimes the specific settings are of importance, but usually much less so than the method of getting to correct exposure of the ambient light and the flash.

This is the photographic equivalent of teaching someone to fish, versus just slapping a fish down on a dinner plate.  Just telling my settings will reveal very little about the how.  And yet, the how is far more important than just a listing of seemingly random figures.

Let’s look at this recent image from one of my workshops on flash photography - especially since it is exactly the kind of thing which I teach during the course of the day.

__(’Read the rest of this entry »’)

While the techniques described on these pages are heavily dependent on shooting indoors which provide places to bounce flash off … it wouldn’t seem possible to use these techniques outdoors.  After all, you can’t bounce flash off the clouds.  (Although we’ve all seen photographers attempt this outside. )

So while there are obvious limitations in applying these bounce flash techniques outdoors, there are times when these techniques can still be quite effective.

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As a start, an example that I show in the tutorial pages is of this image taken at a wedding that I photorgaphed in Aruba.

Here I had my daughter hold up the gold side of the Lastolite reflector. And hopefully this gives the idea of light from the sun setting over the ocean. (It had just gone down, and the light was blandly grey.)

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However, these bounce flash techniques do imply some kind of surface to bounce your flash off.

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But you shouldn’t feel limited by not having an obvious area to bounce light off.
Have a look at this sequence:

Nice evening light:
Settings of  .. 1/125th @ f2 @ 1000 ISO .. exposed properly for skin tones and the dress.
BUT, the evening sky and the light from the lamp are lost.

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1/250th @ f2 @ 320 ISO …
Nice enough detail in the sky and the lamppost, but the couple is lost in murkiness.

So this is (for me anyway), the kind of opportunity where a touch of flash would work wonders.
So I turned my flash-head 90′ to my left, and bounced light into the shop displays.
Not any particular surface .. just off the general shop displays.

And here are the results, still at 1/250th @ f2 @ 320 ISO.

It works for me.
And I know my client will love it when she sees it.

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To show you exactly what I was bouncing light from, have a look at the shop displays to the left in this test shot:

… and this crop from another test shot:

Yup, I bounced flash off that stuff.  Nothing in particular .. but, enough light will spill back from whatever is struck by the light from my flashgun .. to give enough light on my couple to enhance the photo.

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 Here’s another example :

It was really dark already. This was at 1/100th @ f1.2 @ 1250 ISO
Canon 5D and 85mm f1.2 II
I was really squeezing the last bit of light out of the setting we were in.  I wanted to use the tree behind them with the last remaining autumn leaves, but the evening light was also coming from behind them.  So their faces were shaded. Not good.

I therefore bounced flash off the brick wall of the temple.  I’d guess it was about 10 meters from where I was standing.  But enough light spilled back to register at that wide an aperture and high an iso.  Because the light from the flash is now coming in from an angle, the foreground doesn’t have that typical on-camera flash look to it.

Here’s another image from the same sequence.
(I did edit this though for the dark rings under his eyes from lack of sleep. )

But in this example and the previous one that I show here, I got lucky.
There was some kind of surface or objects nearby to bounce light off.

So, would these techniques work outside ?
Maybe.  Quite often not, but sometimes it will. It depends.
It will require some thought.

There is a fundamental principle in lighting :
the larger your light source, the softer your light.

Using any of the myriad of flash modifiers that are on offer, helps in achieving that - spreading the light from the on-camera Speedlight much wider, thereby creating softer light that direct flash would’ve given.  However, (and this is a big however), these flash modifiers also throw light forward.  Ultimately all flash modifiers do the same thing - they disperse a lot of light around the room, while throwing some measure of light directly forward to lift shadows under the eyes and bring a sparkle to the eyes.

That is a huge step up from using direct flash - (or poorly bounced flash.. ie, flash at 45′ or 60′ forward) - but won’t be as good as directional light.  Directional light falls onto your subject from a specific angle.  This direction can very often be carefully chosen even when you use an on-camera flash indoors.

The image at the top is from a wedding I photographed a few weeks ago.
I touched up the WB in RAW, and that’s that. Simple, and it looks just great.
The light is soft, and the baby wasn’t bothered by any direct flash … since there was NO direct flash at all.

[edited to add on Dec 15 : I originally  used the term 'scrim'. 
I have since changed it for the more correct description of 'half-snoot'.]

The way I achieve directional light from my flash is by adding what is in effect, a half-snoot to my on-camera flash.  The half-snoot will partially block the light, and also direct it.  I also very often when shooting in tungsten light, use a filter on my flash to bring the cold light of the flash closer to the warmer tones of tungsten light. 

I simply stick a piece of gel over the head of my Speedlight with some gaffer’s tape. It is low-tech, but it works.

By gelling my flash for tungsten I change the grungy orange backgrounds to a more pleasing warm tone.

The gel used in the image of the baby above, was full CTO.  I keep my camera’s WB to Tungsten.  And in post-production I fine-tune the WB, since by bouncing my flash, it picks up an additional colour from the walls and ceiling.  The gel shown in the illustration here is 1/2 CTS.  I then keep my WB of my camera to 3800 K, which is still much closer to Tungsten, than the 5400K of flash.

The black half-snoot that I add to my Speedlight is just as simple.  It’s a piece of thin black foam bought from an arts store, and then cut smaller.

I keep the piece of black foam tied to my Speedlight with a hair band that I stole from my daughter.  Yup, low-tech and simple … and it works!

This piece of black foam around my Speedlight has two advantages:
1. Directional light.  I can now much more precisely direct where I want my light to come from.
2. Less annoying to others.  In turning my flash to the side or to point behind me, I would risk blasting other people directly in the face with flash. This piece of black foam keeps that from happening.  I now direct my flash over people’s heads, and no flash hits people directly in the eyes.

And thatis the flash modifier I most often use. Total cost is less than $2.oo However, if you feel the need to splash some money on hardware that is custom-made for you, send $40 to my Paypal account.  I will cut a piece of foam for you, add the hair band, and even sign it with silver pen. Oh, go on, you know you want one. It will surely become a collectible.

The additional advantage with this light modifier is that you retain the cool all-black stealthy ninja-photographer look. This is Elisabeth, who often works with me as a 2nd photographer. She’s cool.

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The only other light modifier that I use, is a Stofen cup.  This I use when I am in a situation where I do need light thrown directly forward. I also use it in rooms where the ceiling is too high to successfully shoot with the black half-snoot.

However, I still want a measure of control over where I direct my light.  Therefore I cut a hole in the top of the Stofen so that the majority of light can still be thrown in a direction of my choice, instead of being scattered all around. (I do keep a spare Stofen on hand that is unblemished, as well as an Amber coloured Stofen.)

To be able to flip the Stofen in and out of position, I keep it down with a piece of gaffer’s tape.  So if I want to take a shot without it, I simply flip it over.

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And there they are - the only light modifiers that I use when I use on-camera Speedlights.
In my weddings and portrait work,  I often do use off-camera lighting, whether Speedlights or Q-flashes.  But with on-camera strobes, these are the only light modifiers I use.  And they are all I need.

Most often when photographers start using their flashguns out of the directly-forward position, they move the flash head to point 45’ or 90’ upward. The idea here is to bounce flash off the ceiling. Even though this is an improvement in most cases over using the flashgun pointing directly forward, this is also most often not ideal. We can improve on this.

If we consider how studio lights are set up, we’ll rarely see a light source directly overhead of our subject. Top lighting just isn’t as flattering as light coming in from an angle to the subject. And in the same way, why would we want to bounce flash directly overhead of our subjects?

The subtitle of this post should be: You don’t really need that Lightsphere .
(Or whatever is the flavour of light modifier for this particular month.)

We need to consider the direction of our light carefully. This is one of the areas in which we can really set ourselves apart as photographers – by carefully choosing the direction our light falls onto our subject, we can control the mood of the photograph completely.

We have to think of the actual area that we’re bouncing light off, as our light source – and not of the flashgun as our light source.

Looking at this sequence of photographs, we can see that the direction of light came from slightly behind the subject to the camera’s left. These images were all done using a single on-camera flashgun.

A very important point here is that there is there is no light coming from ‘camera’s viewpoint’. In other words, from our viewpoint (which is the camera’s viewpoint), there is no light directly from directly forward. Therefore, instead of a flat even light, we have directional light. Light is coming in from the side, and creating that interplay between light and shade that creates shape and gives dimension to our subjects. The exact way that flash was bounced here, was by pointing the flashhead 45’ swiveled to the camera’s left, and tilted about 30’ up. To stop any direct flash falling onto the bride, I blocked the strobe with my left hand. This way I shielded the light from her, and the light from the flashgun fell onto the wall to the camera’s left, and slightly behind where she was sitting.

So in effect, our light source is coming from above and slightly behind our bride. This way we’re mimicking the effect that a large softbox would’ve given us.

Another very important point here to remember is, if your subject can see any part of your flashhead, then you are indeed getting direct flash. Or at least a measure of direct flash. Most often this is not flattering. The entire reason why we are bouncing flash, is to create softer light. And direct light from your flashgun will most often not be flattering and negate the quality of light we’re trying to achieve.

Looking at two more images from this sequence, we can see in the close-up images where our light-source is. It is crucial here that we see that the light was not bounced on the ceiling, or even behind us.

Bouncing the light on the ceiling would’ve given darker eye-sockets and that ‘raccoon eyes’ effect. Bouncing light behind us, would’ve given us much softer light from our flashgun than direct flash would’ve given us – but this would’ve produced light that is too flat.

No flash modifier was used, aside from my hand blocking light. Any off-the-shelf light modifier would’ve thrown too much forward, spilling directly on the bride’s face. That direct light would’ve been unflattering.

Just how much flash was used, and how it was balanced with available light, can be deduced from this image on the left.This is the initial image, where I didn’t use flash at all, but used the available light to create a silhouette effect. The same camera settings were used for the images above. Using flash wisely made all the difference.

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In these two images we can see exactly the effect that the flash has had – and how much available light there was. All the light falling on the bride is from the flash on the camera. And here, even more clearly we can discern from the direction of the light, that the light source is the wall to the camera left, and behind the bride. 

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Being very specific about the direction of our light source, we’re able to create flattering portraits with the minimum of fuss.

And being specific abour direction of our light source, means we simply can’t place a flash modifier on our flashgun and shoot without putting much thought into it.

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This web article was first posted in April ‘06 on the DWF, as a tongue-in-cheek reaction - or sarcastic response then, if you will - against the numerous articles and seminars where we photographers are urged to just look for the light.

What triggered me to write this article in the first place, was that there seems to be a trend where use of flash is disdained in favour of only using available light.
As if it is always that simple.

(This article was also published in the Sept ‘06 issue of Rangefinder magazine.)

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Finding the light …

I’ve been so inspired recently by the various photographers at seminars and magazine articles, telling everyone to just look for the light and to find the light.

So many photographers just use available light, and make the rest of us who aren’t blessed with perfect light like they have in la-la-land, feel so inadequate. It is our failing as photographers if we can’t find the light and use it properly.

I felt I had to rise up to this and push myself as a photographer, and just look for the light.  It is there to be found!  Inspired like that, I approached this very colourful Hindu ceremony (April 2006), with a fresh mindset …

The temple itself is beautiful and imposing from the outside, in a blocky New Jersey kinda way.

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The late afternoon light was incredibly harsh, and I knew I had to do something here so that my portraits wouldn’t look like the few candids I had to shoot outside in the sun. So for the portraits, I moved the bride (and others) into the open shade between the pillars in the front. The strong vertical lines behind them helped to make the simple portraits more striking.

Speaking of striking - isn’t she an incredibly beautiful bride?

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Well, I was happy at this point. I was able to get lovely portraits using the light and the setting … but walking inside of the room where the guests were going to dance, my heart sank.

The ceiling was high, with only fluorescent lights, which meant the light was top-heavy and dim.

Light levels were low - 1/60th @ f2.8 @ 1600 iso.
Hmmm .. just not enough to stop action. And the client wouldn’t be too happy with hundreds of impressionistic colour smears for photographs.

But .. I just had to look for the light.
Nevermind that this is a dimly-lit New Jersey room, and not a brightly lit la-la-land venue.

This would be MY failing for not looking for the light,
and finding the light,
and finally .. getting to USE the light.

I scoured the place … and .. sure enough .. there it was .. light!

But .. was it available light?
I looked around .. and sure .. no one else was using it.
It was available! I could use the light!
I saw it and found it, and now I could use it!

And boy! Am I impressed! Just look at the light! Look at the colours pop!
People were dancing around me, and I could stop the action if I chose to, and have faces recognisable. The bride would be able to recognize herself and her friends and family.

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So, a genuine thank you to everyone here who inspired me so to rise above my own inadequacies as a photographer, and just frikkin LOOK for the light.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Neil van Niekerk

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technical info:

The additional strobes that I put up in the corners of the room, were Quantum T2 strobes. They were powered by Quantum 2×2 batteries, and triggered by Quantum 4i radio slaves. The stands are Red-Wing stands. These strobes were run in manual mode, and at 2/3rd stops down from full output, to ensure consistency in exposures in faster sequences of shots.

I also used an on-camera flash which was turned around and slightly bent backwards, with a Stofen with the top cut open. This meant that most of the light from my on-camera strobe was thrown upwards and slightly back .. but because of the Stofen, enough light spilled forward, to ensure there were no raccoon eyes, and that the lighting was as even as I could make it under the circumstances.

Exposure info .. all shots at 1/125th, and 800 iso.
The aperture varied between f4 and f5.0
I diallied the flash exposure compensation down in certain areas of the room.
The on-camera flash exposure was varied from +0.3 to -1.0 EV.
The on-camera strobe was in TTL mode.